Pleasant surprise with my 640XL today

I was going to the shopping center to get an Armour screen protector put on the phone.
Yes, I know it's Gorilla Glass3 but better safe than sorry.

Besides that one of the few things about this phone that I don't like is the glossy screen and they now have a matte screen protector that takes the glare away but otherwise is just like the glossy ones. Really nice from what I've seen of it so far.

Anyway, I had seen an ad for a Japanese Steakhouse at the shopping center and I didn't know where it was so I asked Cortana ( wish I could change the name ) to remind me to look it up when I got to the Superstition Springs Shopping Center.

She asked me if the one at 6555 E. Superstition Blvd was the one I meant ( like there's two of them? ) and I said ' yes ' and she said ' ok I will remind you. '

Well I wasn't expecting much and thought she would probably remind me when I hit the parking lot.
But, no, just silence.

Then as I was walking through the center, just about dead center of it, she came up with the reminder.

I thought that was pretty damn good.

Couldn't believe she was so accurate as to do it right smack in the middle of the center. Although if my errands hadn't taken me to the exact center, she might not have ever given me the reminder.

Anyway, it was a nice surprise to have her work so well.

Her understanding of speech amazes me. I have Dragon Naturally Speaking on my desktop and I can't get it to do near as well as Cortana does.

I complain a lot about the phone so thought it was only right to post about something that works very very well. :)

Yeah, Cortana is pretty darn good. I love her! And about her name.. of course you can't change it. That's for a reason.. Cortana is the character from Halo and it uses the same voice actress as he Halo character. It's an important assistant character from a very important Microsoft game.

Yeah, Cortana is pretty darn good. I love her! And about her name.. of course you can't change it. That's for a reason.. Cortana is the character from Halo and it uses the same voice actress as he Halo character. It's an important assistant character from a very important Microsoft game.

Nicholas,
I hate Code Geass but love, love, love your avatar :P
I should do something Anime related with my own(Probably from Gangsta. or Arslan) :D

But yeah Cortana is pretty awesome. She is a great reminder and more importantly I actually like her name lol

Considering I have little to worry about and if Microsoft and others want to keep up with my boring routine of college, Starbucks, gym, Chili's and the mall, then by all means go for it :)

That's a typical and weak argument in general. You personally can allow and support tracking of your whereabouts by third parties and government all you want, however other people actually like to be left alone and to tend to their own business...

Last edited by RumoredNow; 09-07-2015 at 01:32 PM.
Reason: clean up on aisle 5

As long as there's users, there will always exist those... ready to misinterpret security reports to whatever extent is needed so that they can preach their word of corporate/gov't spies.

At my second job, I want so badly to tell clients "Bro, NO ONE cares about going through your files." when they come in with tape over their camera worrying that one of my IT trainees will go through their stuff.

Last edited by RumoredNow; 09-07-2015 at 01:35 PM.
Reason: cleanup on aisle 5

If "tracking" is a problem, your carrier has you pinging off towers all day every day so your location can be found and tracked that way.

In point of fact, law enforcement will approach your carrier and get 100% cooperation on tracking you. Cortana's owners need not be involved and you turning off Location Services on your phone does nothing to stop the tracking. Did you know if they choose to, law enforcement can listen through your cell phone even when it is powered off? This is old news...

I've had limited usage with location based reminders so far. Once, I told Cortana to remind me of something when I left my mother's house, but the reminder popped up about 4 times while I was still inside the house. Other times when I've told it to remind me when I get to a certain place, that has worked pretty well, whether approaching a specific intersection or being in the parking lot of a public building.

Geofencing only works when entering the circle... I don't think you can set it for exiting the circle. At least not that I've heard of.

If that's the case, I find it strange that Cortana would accept a reminder for "when I leave" a specific place. I just set a test reminder for "when I leave work" today to see what happens. Cortana stored the trigger for the reminder as "when you leave work."

Not so. Your provider has a record of what towers calls/data are routed from, and this is part of doing business, it's inherent to the technology itself.

If government wants that data they have to first have suspect you of committing a crime, and second, then go to a judge present evidence and request a warrant, and then through the phone company they put together a mosaic of information to find out your approximate location. You are not tracked in real time by your phone company or government just because your phone is on, and third parties have no access to phone company tower/routing data. When you turn ALL location based services off, you are not tracked by any source.

Let us know how the test goes... I think the text is just parroting what you input.

The reminder worked yesterday. I work at an old shopping mall that is now mostly business offices. I was parked in the rear parking lot and exited onto a side street that leads to the main road. The reminder popped up when I was about even with the front of the building on that side street.

Maybe the issue I had with the location reminder for leaving my mother's house had to do with how the residential address was geofenced. I was in the back of the house at the time that the reminder was popping up while Cortana might have been looking at my distance from the front of the property next to the street instead of the plot of land at that street address.

Good to know. I never though about getting a reminder "when I leave." I honestly would have thought it impossible. I agree that the smaller the target the more room for error. For instance your Mother's house is nowhere near the size of the aforementioned office park.